Adventures in Kitten Sitting
by Nekobaghira
Summary: Gambit gets a sitter for his kittens while he is out.


Adventures in Kitten Sitting

Gambit had known Fence for years. Not only was Fence a fence, but he was a good friend. Someone he could count on to help with his extracurricular activities. It never hurt to have extra surveillance and intel for some of his more complex jobs he liked to pull off. Those were the jobs that worked out the kinks in every way. Occasionally Fence would ask him to find some things for him to sell. Remy would look for things that would be useful. He had relied on Fence heavily lately and felt he owed him. When Fence said he needed some parts for a strange gadget he picked up, he decided he would just do this job for him.

The X-Men world had gotten strange and two of his apartments were under reconstruction due to the X-Men's poor public relations. He knew he couldn't leave his kittens at his current place. Mystique had already broke in once. It was a matter of time before anyone else who wanted a piece of him would make themselves known. He wasn't going to get his kittens hurt. He had not had them very long but he loved them. They were very comforting to come home to and they loved him no matter what he did.

Fence wasn't sure why he agreed to take care of Remy's kittens. They seemed to be able take care of themselves, but it was important to Remy, so he said he would. He didn't know that Remy was dropping them off at his shop/bakery. Remy joked the number of times his apartments get destroyed was the reason he couldn't just leave them there.

Fence was yelling at Remy through his cellphone: "Your kittens are out of control, they get into everything. You need to train them."

"They ain't dogs Fence, they're kittens. They're suppose to get into things."

"My equipment! The batter for my cakes! They are little bastards, they're into everything. Get back here and take them home!"

"Can't mon ami. You said you'd care for them while I'm gone. I'll only be a away for a few days. Play with them, they love toys. Laser pointers tire them out." Remy hung up.

Fence was furious. Remy hung up, how dare he hang up and not get those little monsters? The kittens had disappeared and he wasn't sure where they went. At least they weren't in the kitchen. He had a cake and cookie orders to finish up before finding a room to put the little hell-raisers in for the evening.

The rest of the evening was uneventful as far as the kittens were concerned. Fence finished up with his cake and cookies orders and put them in their packaging for the next day. He considered shortening his hours at the bakery while he had little terrorists running amok in his place. He felt a pang of guilt for feeling that way. They were cute. They were just young and got into trouble easily which reminded him of Remy.

After cleaning the kitchen in the bakery, Fence went to his other side project. He was hoping while Remy was away he would find a part or two he could use in the machine he happened to get his hands on. He made money off any tech, alien, Stark or whatever else was available. Gadgets made him some great moola. Of course, knowing what these things could do helped in resale value. And he had to admit he was always fascinated in the mechanics and inner workings. That usually lead to some odd things happening, but nothing he couldn't handle.

Fence used the bakery as a place to think or distract himself from his main job, which was acquiring and selling all kinds of technology. There was no limit, he preferred the alien tech because he could get the most for it but the problem with alien tech was figuring it out before trying to sell it. Baking helped settle his mind for those types of quandaries.

After closing the kitchen, he grabbed a bite to eat and then put his plans in motion for checking out his latest piece of technology that he had acquired. The device created short term clones, the goal was creating enough to complete projects at an increased rate. The clones would then dissipate once the project was complete. Fence had been working on this piece for a few weeks, every attempt to make it work properly had failed. All the clones died immediately or shortly after. Usually all it took was a touch or for the clone to run into something. The molecules were not stable. He really wished he got technical manuals when picking up odd technology, though he prided himself on figuring things out very quickly.

The device looked like some sort of ray gun cannon out of a _Star Wars_ movie. When you pointed and clicked a trigger, a dot would appear. It was a beam that directed the energy from the gun to the intended target. Fence laughed when he looked at it because the "Great, kid. Don't get cocky. " line would come to him from _Star Wars _whenever he spun the thing around. It felt like shooting the bad guys in the film.

Fence had been working on the device for a few hours. He hadn't seen or heard the kittens and just assumed they were asleep somewhere. He finally got the right electrical connection and the device lit up. He was giddy as a school girl, the device looked like it was ready. All that was left was an experiment and he would rolling in the dough, and not his bakery kind.

He had set some plants on the floor. He intended to use the device to clone them. If it worked he would be able to sell it for a considerable amount of money. He clicked the switch on and was trying to get a good grip on it. It was bulky in size and shape, similar to holding a rocket launcher, but you had to hold it with your hands and couldn't rest it on your shoulder. He put the setting on ten and made sure the beam setting was wide enough to hit all of the plants he had lined up.

He didn't notice the three little kittens had run into his lab. They were searching for the dot that always accompanied the click noise. Fence aimed the device at his plants on the floor and didn't see the kittens until it was too late. He hit them with the beam. Fence freaked out trying to turn off the machine. By the time he got the device under control and off, there were thirty kittens running around his lab.

Fence couldn't believe his eyes, thirty kittens running all over his place causing trouble. And what the hell was he gonna tell Remy? He wondered if he could distinguish the clones from the originals. He thought it would be best to round them all up in one place. He collected a few of them and locked them in his lab. He went to his bakery to collect more and found kittens licking the butter frosting on his cupcakes.

"Hey, get out of there!" he shouted at them but they were not listening and continued eating the frosting.

He ran to them, scooped them up and put them in the same room as the others. When he got back to the bakery there were a couple of kittens chasing each other on the counter tops. They knocked over flour that went everywhere as well as the boxes that would hold cupcakes. The boxes fell to the floor and more kittens jumped in and out of the boxes and batted the flour around the floor. He rounded them up and put them with the others.

Another set of kittens was taking the threat from paper towels seriously, the ferocity of their biting and kicking the paper product produced enough confetti to add to the mess the other kittens had created. Fence heard a crash and his entire container of M&M's hit the floor and kittens where batting the little round pieces in every direction. He was ready to rip his hair out with the little monsters. How could something so cute be so evil?

He did a kitten count and he had all thirty kittens in his lab. Now it was time to figure out what to do with all of these cats and what to tell Remy.

There were a couple of kittens eating his plants and one or two using his other plants as litter boxes. Another kitten was busy digging in the dirt and tossing it on the floor. He went to shoo them from his plants and one of the kittens ran into the watering can he kept nearby for his plants. The water can spilled over and some of the kittens who were hit with the water disappeared.

Fence was relieved and disappointed. His was relieved at how easy it would be to get rid of the clones and only have the three original kittens, but disappointed that the device didn't really work. He grabbed his water bottle that he had to water his plants and started squirting kittens. He started with the big sleeping kitten pile near his work bench. They were cute but it was an easy way to get rid of cloned kittens quickly. The rest of the kittens didn't make it easy on him they ran from him and the water. He chased the others around until he only had three kittens left.

Once he got to the original three and squirted them just to be sure. Besides it made him feel better considering all the trouble they caused. They ran under his work table to hide from him. They were not happy being wet. There was nothing he could do to coax them out. Just as he was about to try some chicken, Remy walked into his place and strolled into his lab.

The kittens immediately ran to Remy, mewling at him and wanting his attention. He bent down to pet them and noticed they were all wet. "Fence, why are my kittens wet?"

"I told you they were out of control and needed training. I was teaching them to not get on the counter."

Remy looked at Fence with a raised eyebrow. He had a feeling he was being lied to but decided to let it go. He tossed Fence a gadget he had been looking for in payment for watching his kittens. Fence was excited about the item because it was exactly what he needed to fix his cloning machine.

"You're back early," Fence wanted to change the topic.

"Yeah, it was easier than I thought. Thanks for taking care of 'em," Remy smiled at his kittens. He scooped up his little furkids and went home to his apartment.

Fence locked up his place after Remy left with his monsters. The lab was easy to clean up, the kittens didn't seem to have caused as much damage there, though some of his plants were wrecked. His bakery was a different story. He couldn't believe the mess. He started sweeping up the flour and M&M's and thought about the little trouble makers. He had to admit he did like them around at night when he slept. He picked up all the boxes and put them in the recycling bin. He threw out the cupcakes then went to work on cleaning and sanitizing the counter tops. It was actually therapeutic, he was no longer angry with the kittens or Remy for bringing them to him to watch. He chided himself, his friendship with Remy meant a lot to him and he would help anyway he could. However, perhaps the next time he was asked to kitten sit, he would make Remy take him to the opera again and perhaps find them both dates too.

* * *

Mystique gives Gambit 3 kittens in Astonishing Xmen #62. Fence is from the Gambit solo written by James Asmus. Fence first appears in the Gambit solo with issue #2. Fence loves the opera and Remy has taken him to the opera in A+X #3. The kittens are nameless until Gambit #15.


End file.
